Hoax ads called for rape in revenge

Prosecutors say bogus postings amount to a crime; defendant says it was prank that got out of control

San Diego  Consumed with bitterness over losing her Carmel Valley dream home to a couple with a higher bid, Kathy Rowe found an outlet for her anger: revenge.

But what she is calling a childish prank, prosecutors say was a perverse scheme to have a woman raped.

The payback against the young husband and wife homebuyers started mildly enough, court records show. Putting a stop on their mail. Signing them up for catalogs for incontinence supplies. Sending religious missionaries to their doorstep.

It’s what Rowe did next that could send her to prison.

She posed as the wife in online adult entertainment ads titled “Carmel Valley Freak Show,” inviting strange men over to the couple’s home for sex and describing scenarios of a rape fantasy to those who responded. The wife’s photo and address were included in the postings.

“I love to be surprised and have a man just show up at my door and force his way in the door and on me, totally taking me while I say no,” Rowe wrote to one man who responded.

One man decided to follow up on the offer, but was thwarted once by a locked gate and a second time when the husband answered the door.

A legal dispute is now brewing over the felony charges Rowe faces in connection with the postings.

The state appeals court ruled on Friday that Rowe, 52, will have to answer to felony charges of solicitation of rape and solicitation of sodomy — two charges that a Superior Court judge had previously dismissed from the case.

At issue is Rowe’s intent. Did she really mean for her to be raped? Does it even matter?

Pranks escalate

Rowe, a county administrative analyst, thought she had found the perfect home for her family in 2011. It was a single story, to accommodate her severely disabled daughter, and had a pool, to provide exercise for her husband following a heart attack.

But due to miscommunication with real estate agents, and a more attractive bid from the other couple, she lost the house.

In a letter to a judge, Rowe described the moment as “devastating.”

“The anger and grief over losing that house (and especially in the way we did) drove me to behave in a very childish way and to do what I thought were childish pranks to let off steam and ease the pain,” Rowe said. “I never intended for them to be hurtful.”

The couple, as well as their lawyer, did not respond to a request for an interview.

According to detailed court filings in the case, Rowe first tried to buy the home from the couple, sending them a letter offering them $100,000 above the asking price. It was declined. Then weird things started to happen.

The husband testified during a preliminary hearing that about a month after he and his wife moved in, people came by the door interested in a “for sale” posting on the real estate website Zillow.

By Christmas, mail had stopped coming to the house. A stop had been issued in his wife’s name.